As I continue to reflect on the oral arguments that were recently made in the Supreme Court regarding marriage, I noticed that one word—an “F” word—was used more times than almost any other word other than the obvious words “people” and “marriage.” And the way it was used makes me think of another “F” word that may turn out to be more fitting.

In case you’re wondering, the “F” word that was used in Court was not the one that gets bleeped by media censors. But in much the same way as that “F” word seems to get thrown around indiscriminately these days without any reflection on its meaning, the same happened with the word I have in mind.

What Is the ‘F’ Word?

That word is “fundamental.” It was used forty times by either the Justices or the lawyers and in the context that marriage is a fundamental right. The most interesting use of the “fundamental” word was by Justice Sotomayor, whose use was similar to that of Justice Breyer. Here is what she said:

“The right to marriage is, I think, embedded in our constitutional law. It is a fundamental right. … The issue is you can’t narrow it down to say, but is gay marriage fundamental? Has black-and-white marriage been treated fundamentally? The issue was starting from the proposition of, is the right to marry fundamental? And then is it compelling for a State to exclude a group of people?”

But Justice Sotomayor’s starting point is wrong, and as a result she will wrongly conclude that same-sex “marriage” is the equivalent of marriage as it’s been understood for “millennia.”

The Wrong Starting Point

The “starting proposition” isn’t that marriage is a fundamental right. She assumes that it’s fundamental. However, neither she nor Justice Breyer ever articulated any basis for why marriage has been treated as a fundamental right in the past.

As I tell those who attend our Stand for Truth Seminar, “Make those who throw around key words explain what they mean by them and defend them.” And, sadly, no one ever made Justice Breyer or Sotomayor do so.

The point is this: You can’t decide if something is “fundamental” until you know what it is. And then you have to decide what it is that makes that thing fundamental. Only then can you determine if some other thing—in this case same-sex relationships—shares in or partakes of that which made the original thing fundamental.

In this case, the “thing” is “marriage,” and until recently it was always made up of a man and a woman. So what about that relationship might have made us think it is fundamental?

What Makes Marriage ‘Fundamental?’

If we’re going to exclude the possibility of a theological answer, then Webster’s Dictionary provides a little logical help to us here. The first and primary definition of the word “fundamental” is this:

a: serving as an original or generating source : primaryb: serving as a basis supporting existence or determining essential structure or function

Let’s not ignore the obvious here, as many of our Justices apparently want to do. What might the relationship between a man and a woman have been “original” in relationship to or what might the relationship between a man and a woman have been a “generating source” of?

How about children? How about the future generation? How about the ongoing existence of the community or state?

Of course, that is what made previous societies and states think marriage was “fundamental.” There was no future society or state without that relationship! In that sense, it was “serving as a basis supporting existence,” as Webster put it.

Same-Sex ‘Marriage’ Cannot be Fundamental

And how does a relationship between two people of the same sex provide “origin” to or become a “generating source” for children and future generations and thereby “support the existence” going forward of community, society, and the state? It doesn’t and can’t except for the intervention of science.

But that intervention itself proves that same-sex “marriage” is not the same kind of thing;
same-sex “marriage” does not share at all in that which is “fundamental” to marriage or, more importantly, that which made marriage “fundamental.” If Justice Kennedy will stop to think about it, that may explain why for “millennia,” as he noted, no one ever thought same-sex “marriage” was fundamental.

So, we can define marriage any way we want, but if we do, it will cease to be something fundamental to anything and will take on the character of another “F” word—fungible. Any relationship among any number and type of people will have to be deemed a marriage if Justice Sotomayor’s thinking prevails.

David Fowler served in the Tennessee state Senate for 12 years before joining FACT as President in 2006. Read David’s complete bio.